Cartons, such as clamshell cartons, are utilized in food service industries to hold various food items, such as hamburgers and hotdogs. Typical cartons are made from card board. Printing may be provided on one side of the carton to identify the food item within the carton.
In an effort to improve food item sales, various promotional techniques may be employed, such as providing prizes to those that purchase the food items. The prize may be indicated on a tamper evident sticker attached to the side of the carton. To determine whether a prize may have been won, a consumer peals back a tab on the tamper evident sticker to reveal the prize if any.
Alternatively, the prize information may simply be printed on the carton. For example, a code may be printed on the side of the carton. After purchasing the food item, the consumer enters the code on an online website to determine whether he has won a prize.
Typically, the consumer must hold onto the carton until he has time to redeem any prize that may be offered. But most cartons are bulky. The carton may also be carrying remnants of the food item previously stored in the carton, such as ketchup and mustard. This leads to sanitary problems if the consumer must hold onto the container for an extended period of time.
In addition, tamper evident stickers require an additional operation in the manufacturing process, namely that the sticker be placed on the carton. While printing directly on a carton solves this problem, a new problem is created in that employees of the restaurant selling the food item may simply identify cartons associated with winning prizes and may try to redeem the prize for themselves, thus depriving the restaurant of any benefits associated with the prize.